Audi Cross Pro Build

[Nomadstealth]

I’m looking at building this one as clean as possible , as many of the cables and electrics as possible will be internally routed . I’m going to be using a Tongsheng and a 16ah battery , nothing overly powerful but street legal in Australia . I had to wait until I had the Frame in hand before I could order some of the parts , Currently waiting on a rear shock , shock hardware and a dropper post , that could take a while . I’ll push ahead with the rest of it . Being able to say that I’ve got an Audi e-bike is one of the best bits . Photos coming soon .

 

[calab]

You tease, whats the exact shock you bought to install on the beast!

 

[Nomadstealth]

You tease, whats the exact shock you bought to install on the beast!

!65mm shocks aren’t very common , I’ve ordered a DNM from China .

 

[Nomadstealth]

The donor bike , everything except the frame , fork , seat post and handlebars will be used on the Audi build .

 

[99t4]

Other than the noble name and brand, what are the strong points of this frame?

 

[Nomadstealth]

Other than the noble name and brand, what are the strong points of this frame?

You're correct , the strongest point is the noble name and brand . As far as I understand Audi only have 500 of these made a year so converting one makes it a very unique bike . Other than that , it's a good light weight frame with a low stand over height that lends itself to routing nearly everything internally . A conversion that's as neat as possible is what I'm looking for .

 

[Nomadstealth]

I've got the front end , motor and battery mounted . Next is the brakes and drive train . Obviously the timber shock is temporary .

 

[Nomadstealth]

All of the wiring on the Audi is now complete and the only cable left to finish is for the dropper post . I re-shaped the swing arm with a piece of 20mm solid round bar and a hammer so that the Tongsheng sits in flush to the bottom bracket . I tried a 5mm spacer but the cranks ended up 14mm offset (even with the Lekkie left offset crank) . 14mm is too much in my opinion . With the re-shaping it’s down to 4mm , much nicer . The problem I’ve got now is that the offset chainring doesn’t fit on the inside . I’m going to change it to a 104mm BCD straight narrow wide . This bike is the one that replaces the ‘store runner’ so the bracket on the swing arm is for a basket . The wheels are mis-matched for now . They will both be American Classic once I change the front hub to a 20mm through axle . The timber shock simulates where the bike sits when the shock is fully compressed .

For those who don’t know , the Audi isn’t my primary go-to . The bike I ride most of the time is the Santa Cruz Nomad with the CYC X1 Stealth Gen 1 .

 

[Nomadstealth]

The tight and busy bit .

 

[electric_nz]

Awesome!! A great looking bike for sure.

Will the battery be close to the front wheel at full shock compression?

 

[Nomadstealth]

Awesome!! A great looking bike for sure.

Will the battery be close to the front wheel at full shock compression?

Thanks , I think it’s going to look good once it’s complete .

The battery would be really close to the front wheel at full compression , but the chances of this bike seeing full compression are pretty slim with the extra firm spring that’s in the forks . This bike is a store runner , the biggest drops being done will be curbs . Right now it looks close because the front wheel that’s fitted has a 2.8” tire , the wheel that I’m building will have a 2.4” tire .

 

[Nomadstealth]

The Audi is now rideable after fitting the shock , dropper post and seat . The post and seat were straight forward but the shock was a different story . The frame has 10mm mounting holes and the gap is 29mm at the front and 22mm at the rear , the mounting kit I had was 8mm holes and 24mm wide . A bit of drilling , filing and some stainless washers fixed the problem , 3 hours later .

I decided to use the DT Swiss Wheelset that I had so at least something on the bike is European . The Bars and Stem are Red Line BMX Cruiser from the donor bike , the ones I was going to use were way too XC Racer , not what I want .

A sneak peak at the good side to show the how the Lekkie Cranks and Hope Chainring look together . I’ve been taking photos of the not so good side so that you can see that there’s a minimal amount of visible cable bundling .

The Tongsheng kit I’m using has an 850C display and a Bafang style main wiring harness . I’ve added 3 extra bearings to the spindle for some stiffness and to minimise the chance of breakage . The only thing I’m going to add is some 2mm Chainring spacers to get the chain line as good as I can .

The Battery to Front wheel clearance is tight , really tight , but not as bad as it looks when you plot it out . As I’ve said , this Bike won’t see full compression . Sill , it’s good to know that there’s at least 115mm of usable travel from the 125mm Forks .

Has anyone tried the Juin Tech hydraulic-mechanical disc brakes ? They are awesome . Look them up , hydraulic brakes that are cable actuated .

 

[Nomadstealth]

Juin Tech hydraulic-mechanical disc brakes

 

[Nomadstealth]

Everything is now complete and I’ve got a fully functioning store runner / buddy bike . It’s a really nice bike to ride and I’ve had it up over 30MPH using PAS (no throttle for me) . There’s nothing like passing other cyclists on a bike with a basket on the back . The whole basket / rack assembly is easily removeable with 4 allen head bolts .

I ended up using an inline brake cut out on the rear brake for those times when you’re stopped with a foot on the pedal and waiting to go . Anyone with a Tongsheng knows what happens if you haven’t got a cut out . The handlebars are fairly uncluttered because , as I’ve mentioned , I don’t have a throttle and there’s no wires to the brake levers . I say fairly uncluttered because there’s still 4 cables and I wire , but you can imagine what 3 additional wires and a throttle would look like .

I like the Audi so much that I bought a 1/10th scale model . How many bikes do they make models of ? what !

I’ll let the photos tell the rest of the story .

 

[Nomadstealth]

Trek to Audi

 

[99t4]

Very nice! What keeps the rear rack from swinging side to side?

 

[Nomadstealth]

Very nice! What keeps the rear rack from swinging side to side?

Thanks 99t4 , the rear rack / basket is based on an Aeroe pannier rack . They’re made to fit a wide variety of bikes including dual suspension . They’re really solid , there’s hardly any movement

 

[Nomadstealth]

I’ve been riding the Audi for about 5 months without any big problems . I’ve made quite a few changes along the way and it’s now in what I’d like to think is it’s finished state , what was the Audi Cross Pro is now the Audi Cross Pro E-Tron GT . The biggest , and most relevant , change is going from a Tongsheng TSDZ2 to a Tongsheng TSDZ2B with an 860C display and OSF . Nothing night and day but it’s smoother and gets slightly better range . The additional information on the display is a bonus .

Othe changes made :-

1. 130mm travel Marzocchi bombers
2. Fox float shock
3. Avid hydraulic disc brakes
4. American classic wheel set
5. Maxxis DTH 2.3” tires
6. Deity 80mm rise bars
7. Ergotec 40mm rise stem
8. Stone 40T chainring on a 130 BCD spider
9. Orange bits and pieces to tie it all together